Category: Coffee

Random notes

lpaulriddle

Still experimenting with the light roast coffee beans I picked up the other day in Bethany. This was an improvement over yesterday:

  • Local Coffee Roasting Co. Breakfast Blend (Guatemala/Colombia)
  • 11 grams coffee, ground at 39 clicks on the JX (1.5 turns minus 6 clicks)
  • 200 grams water at full boil (1:18.1)
  • Two paper filters
  1. 20 second pour
  2. Steep 2 minutes
  3. Take off scale and swirl
  4. Wait 30 seconds
  5. Press 30 seconds

Compared to yesterday, this was ground slightly finer (39 vs 42 clicks) and poured right off the boil, instead of 99°C. Arguably not much of a difference there, but I suspect that due to heat loss, this gives an actual steeping temperature close to 99°, which is what the Hoffmann recipe calls for. The cup definitely had more flavor than yesterday’s. Just to make sure I’m extracting these beans as much as I can, I may try drawing the brew time out a little longer, and see if I can get it to the point where I start to taste some bitterness. At that point I’ll back off the brew time a little bit, and see if the cup is as strong as I would like. It’s worth noting that the instructions on the bag of beans specify a 1:17 ratio, which is slightly more coffee than I’m using here.

I got out at around 6:40 this morning and ran 5.3 miles. I felt a little better than I did Sunday. I woke up slightly sore after climbing yesterday evening and swimming yesterday afternoon, and wasn’t initially sure I wanted to go out, but once I get moving, I felt fine. Climbing went well last night. I climbed 4 routes on lead and 4 on top rope, at grades ranging from 5.8 to 5.10+. It was my first time leading in about a month. Lead climbing is one of those things you have to keep doing regularly to stay comfortable and confident on the wall.

This and that..

lpaulriddle

On July 6, I noted some recent issues with tightness in my right calf, which has been a recurring issue with me. I’ve suspected that poor kicking form while swimming freestyle and backstroke might contribute to this. I did not swim at all while we were on vacation last week, and had no tightness issues for the entire week. However, I’m noticing that a little bit of tightness is back today, also in the right calf, and I have not yet been in the pool. It just occurred to me that both days I’ve had the issues were right after I took long drives. On July 4, we took a 6-hour day trip to Pennsylvania, and yesterday was a 4-hour(!) drive home from Bethany. My right leg, of course, is the side I use for the accelerator pedal. Could there be a connection here?

While at the shore, I picked up a few half-pound bags of coffee beans, including some light roast (breakfast blend) from Local Coffee Roasting Co. in Roxana, DE. Today was my first foray into brewing anything lighter than medium roast in the AeroPress. I followed the James Hoffmann recipe pretty closely:

  • 11 grams coffee, ground at 42 clicks on the JX (1.5 turns minus 3 clicks)
  • 200 grams water at 99°C (1:18.1)
  • Two paper filters
  1. 20 second pour
  2. Steep 2 minutes
  3. Take off scale and swirl
  4. Wait 30 seconds
  5. Press 30 seconds

The end result was OK, but lacking in flavor, which tells me I’m probably not getting enough extraction from the beans. In his video, Hoffmann recommends adjusting either the grind size or the water temperature to address this, instead of upping the amount of coffee, which you might do with a darker roast. Next time, I may try going a little bit finer with the grind, and possibly heating the kettle water to a full boil and pouring directly off that.

Ride/Brew Notes

lpaulriddle

Today’s ride took me west from Bethany to Frankford (DE) and back, passing through the town of Omar along the way. On the whole, this is a more pleasant ride than south through Bayard, because there is less traffic, and the roads are wider and more bike-friendly. The town of Frankford itself is something of an exception, with more traffic and narrower roads that are not exceptionally well-maintained, but that’s a rather small portion of the ride. My total distance was just under 24 miles, which is about what I set out for today. From Frankford, the route can be extended by heading north to Dagsboro, South to Selbyville, or even east to Fenwick via DE-20 and DE-54.

I’ve been making a glass of cold brew every day this week, and I think I’ve gotten it nailed down to this recipe:

  1. Pre-moisten 2 new or used paper AeroPress filters
  2. Set AeroPress up in inverted orientation
  3. Add 1 heaping scoop (roughly 15 grams) Wellsley Farms Breakfast Blend pre-ground medium roast coffee
  4. Fill AeroPress a little over halfway with room temperature water
  5. Stir vigorously for 1 minute
  6. Press slowly into an 8-ounce glass
  7. Add ice and top with water

I had been brewing this in standard orientation previously, but a lot of water was dripping through while stirring, which the inverted orientation avoids. I think inverted produced a slightly superior result, but I’d have to do a blind taste test to say for sure. Next time, I think I’m going to try topping off with milk or cream, and see how that tastes.

I also found that using the drip coffee brewer makes a better hot cup with this coffee than the AeroPress method I was using earlier in the week. I’ve been using 4 level tablespoons coffee to 8 ounces (1 cup) water. I’m sure I could get better results from the AP with a little bit of tweaking, but haven’t really bothered fooling around with it.

Beach Brew

lpaulriddle

I brought my AeroPress on vacation with me, along with a big bag of Wellsley Farms Breakfast Blend pre-ground coffee, in hopes of using most of it up before its “best before” date in early August. After a few rather unsuccessful attempts to brew a good hot cup with the equipment available to me here, I decided to try the cold brew recipe from the AeroPress web site. I’ve tried making regular cold brew in a French press, which takes 24 hours and requires a coarse grind. I’ve also tried making pour-over iced coffee, also with the Wellsley Farms pre-ground beans. Both turned out pretty good, but I think the cold brew was slightly better. The AeroPress recipe produced a decent cup more quickly than the French Press and with less work than making pour-over iced coffee. I’ll probably experiment with this recipe a few more times this week. One thing that I noticed is that the long stir time allows more water than usual to drip through the filter before pressing. I might eventually try brewing this with the AP inverted (which would avoid the dripping) and see if it makes any noticeable difference.

Today’s Brew Recipe

lpaulriddle
  • Beans: Lost Dog Coffee “Mocha Sidamo” Organic Dark Roast (Ethiopia)
  • 17 grams coffee, 200 grams brew water
  • 85°C water
  • JX 1 rotation plus 6 clicks, or 36 total clicks (fine)
  • 2 pre-moistened paper filters
  1. 20 second pour
  2. 1 minute steep (no bloom or agitation)
  3. 30 second press

This is basically a simplified version of V60 Style Aeropress (dark roast) that uses less water and eliminates the bypass. It brewed a better cup than the recipe I used yesterday, but still not the best cup I’ve gotten out of these beans. I’m still trying to figure out what I did that time and how to replicate it, but I guess I’m getting closer. Previously, I brewed the recipe at the same ratio, but used 160 grams of brew water and 40 grams of bypass. I’m curious if the bypass makes any real difference in the taste. Maybe I should brew two cups and do a blind taste test. Unfortunately, I’m starting to run low on these beans… 😀

Brew Notes

lpaulriddle

I brewed my Lost Dog Mocha Sidamo dark roast beans today using this exact recipe, just as an experiment, as it produces great results with my other bag of medium/medium-dark beans. I had brewed a variation of the same recipe with the Mocha Sidamo beans recently, and noted that it seemed a little under-extracted, so it seemed logical to try upping the temperature a little bit and using a tiny bit finer grind size. It turned out… okay, but a little bit weak tasting. Flavor-wise, it seemed fine, so maybe I need more coffee to get the richer taste I’m looking for. Or, maybe this just isn’t the ideal recipe to be using with dark roast. I seemed to get better results using a different recipe that calls for a finer grind and shorter brew time. I found this article, which has some good info about brewing dark roasted beans, and it seems to support the theory that shorter brew times are better. It’s worth noting that I preferred the other recipe at around a 1:12 ratio, while today’s was 1:13.3. I should try brewing both recipes at 1:12, and see which one turns out better. That would mean 17 grams of coffee to 200 grams of water (actually around 1:11.8).

Afternoon notes

lpaulriddle

Something is definitely up with my right foot and calf, as I’ve been getting some discomfort in the rear of the foot towards the heel while walking on my treadmill desk. My right calf also seems really tight, which is an issue I’ve dealt with a lot over the years. As I wrote yesterday, I suspect that it is an ankle mobility issue. It has gotten a little bit worse since I started swimming backstroke a few days ago, and I do think my kicking technique needs a lot of work. For the time being, I am going to stop doing backstroke and probably cut down a bit on freestyle, focusing more on breaststroke and butterfly, and see if it calms down. I’m also going to focus a little bit more on exercises to improve ankle mobility. I found this page, which seems like a pretty good resource.

I tried making some iced coffee this afternoon. I have a fair amount of pre-ground Wellsley Farms (BJ’s store brand) breakfast blend coffee with a “best by” date of August 2023, so I’m looking for creative ways to use it up. Since it’s ground fine for drip machines, it’s not ideal to use for cold brew, so I decided to try this recipe for iced coffee. I followed the recipe to the letter, using my electric kettle and measuring everything out with a scale. It’s the closest I’ve come to doing pour-over coffee. I don’t (yet) have a pour-over dripper, so I used a strainer and a regular coffee filter, and dripped the coffee into a Pyrex 2 quart measuring cup. Ideally, I need something a little bit deeper for this, as I had to lift the strainer up at the end to keep it out of the brewed coffee. But other than that, it turned out fine, and made about 24 ounces of iced coffee. It wasn’t all that strong, but good for a summer afternoon. I tried mixing some with a little bit of chocolate almond milk, which was tasty, but the almond milk doesn’t mix well with the water, and I had to keep stirring it to keep it from settling. Real dairy milk might fare better. At any rate, I’ll probably try doing this again.

Last Cup

lpaulriddle

I brewed my last full cup of coffee with my Starbucks medium roast beans this morning, which is noteworthy only because this was my first foray into grinding beans myself. I’ve had the bag since last winter, and started out using a blade grinder and a drip coffee maker. Needless to say, the results were inconsistent — some cups were good, and others were not so good! I soon switched to a good quality burr grinder and a French press, which produced much better results. Somewhere along the way, I started measuring beans and water by weight rather than volume. Then, I upgraded from a cheap electric kettle to an expensive one that lets me heat water to a specific temperature, and I added an Aeropress. I now brew most of my cups with the electric kettle, burr grinder, scale, and either Aeropress or French press. But the point is, these beans have been with me through the entire progression.

I brewed this recipe with the Starbucks beans yesterday and today. Yesterday’s cup turned out pretty good, but ever so slightly bitter. Today’s was great. The difference: yesterday, I dumped the beans into the grinder directly from the jar, and a lot of “fines”, husks, and other smaller fragments from the bottom of the bag got mixed in there, which I suspect imparted a little bit of bitterness. Today, I made sure that only whole beans got into the grinder, and the result was a better cup.

There are still a few beans left at the bottom of the jar, which I’ll probably grind up along with the fragments and use for cold brew. I guess it won’t be too long before I’ll be looking to buy some new beans.

Brew Notes

lpaulriddle
  • Beans: Lost Dog Coffee “Mocha Sidamo” dark
  • Grind: “Finer end of medium” – 1.5 turns on the JX PLUS 3 clicks, or 48 total clicks
  • 85°C water
  • 16 grams coffee / 200 grams water
  • James Hoffmann’s Ultimate Aeropress Recipe

I’ve used a different recipe with these beans several times, with pretty good results, but I just wanted to try something different. I decided to try yesterday’s recipe, with a couple of tweaks: 16 grams coffee (vs 15), 85°C water (vs 90°C), and 48 clicks on the JX (vs 42, or slightly coarser). Compared to the recipe I’ve previously used with these beans, this one uses the same water temperature, with a coarser grind (48 clicks vs 36) and a longer brew time. The other recipe also uses less water for the brew (160 grams) and 40 grams bypass water. Today’s cup turned out OK, but maybe slightly underextracted. Next time, I could either increase the water temperature to 90°C, or go with a slightly finer grind.

A tale of 2 brews

lpaulriddle
  • Beans: Lost Dog Coffee “La Esparanza” medium/medium-dark
  • Grind: “Finer end of medium” – 1.5 turns on the JX minus 3 clicks, or 42 total clicks
  • 90°C water
  • 15 grams coffee / “around” 200 grams water
  • James Hoffmann’s Ultimate Aeropress Recipe

I’ve been using a different recipe with these beans, and while the first cup was great, I’ve had mixed results with subsequent cups. After a slightly bitter cup this morning, I decided to try the James Hoffmann recipe this afternoon. Two days ago, it gave me great results with medium roast Starbucks beans. However, my brain must have been somewhere else this afternoon. I used the same grind setting and water temperature, which I guess you can argue are the two most important parameters. However, I forgot to zero my scale before adding the water to the brewer, so I’m not sure how much I used. I just filled it up to what looked like 200 grams. It might have been a little less. Then, I turned my kettle off while the coffee was brewing, forgetting that I was using the stopwatch to time it. So, I guesstimated the initial steep time as well. I think it was around 2 minutes (per the recipe). The swirl, secondary steep, and plunge went off without a hitch, though.

As I was winging this, I was betting myself that it was going to end up being the best cup of coffee I ever tasted. Well, I’m not sure I’d go that far, but it was pretty darned good — definitely better than any other recipe I’ve used with these beans — and who knows if I’ll be able to reproduce it. Go figure. 😀 I guess it goes to show that you don’t always have to be 100% precise to brew a great cup of coffee with the Aeropress. Doing it consistently is still a work in progress, though!